--- description: See an exclusive clip from the Oscar-nominated documentary 'Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah' title: Oscar-Nominated Documentary Explores the Making of 'Shoah' image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3f5c3f04bd4ebf39/69887cc43c1639cb2245bf02/lanzmann.jpeg?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [History](/section/history/) ## History Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [movies](/tag/movies/) ## movies Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Watch: Inside the Making of _Shoah_  by [Lily Rothman](/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Feb 17, 2016 2:00 PM CUT  Claude Lanzmann (born in 1925), French director and writer, 1985. Claude Lanzmann (born in 1925), French director and writer, 1985.Jean-Regis Roustan—Roger Viollet/Getty Images  by [Lily Rothman](/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Feb 17, 2016 2:00 PM CUT In 1973, the filmmaker Claude Lanzmann was given two years to make a two-hour movie about the Holocaust. The result, _Shoah_, was finally released in 1985 and was almost five times longer than had been intended.But it met with almost-universal acclaim, with TIME’s critic Richard Corliss saying that _Shoah_ proved that even a period as extensively chronicled as the Holocaust could still yield “stories worth hearing, and ravaged, resilient faces that reward our scrutiny.” The new short documentary _Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah_, which is nominated for an Oscar, explores the unique process behind making the iconic film. Lanzmann spent the first portion of his work collecting interviews with those who had witnessed, and in some case caused, the horror. He turned away from archival footage and instead focused on personal recollection, sometimes captured via secret camera. By 1980, when the five-year process of editing began, he had collected 200 hours of tape. As shown in this exclusive clip provided by HBO, Lanzmann readily acknowledges how difficult the process was—in part due to his own demanding artistic personality. [_Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah_](http://www.lanzmannfilm.com/ "undefined") will debut on HBO on May 2. **_Read the original 1985 review of_** **Shoah** **_, here in the TIME Vault:_** [The Horror and the Pity](http://time.com/vault/issue/1985-11-04/page/96/ "undefined") ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4213811/editing-shoah-exclusive-clip/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4213811/editing-shoah-exclusive-clip/"},"headline":"Watch: Inside the Making of Shoah","datePublished":"2016-02-17T14:00:02.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T14:54:33.007Z","description":"See an exclusive clip from the Oscar-nominated documentary 'Claude Lanzmann: Spectres of the Shoah'","url":"https://time.com/4213811/editing-shoah-exclusive-clip/","keywords":["movies","Holocaust","WWII"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3f5c3f04bd4ebf39/69887cc43c1639cb2245bf02/lanzmann.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt3f5c3f04bd4ebf39/69887cc43c1639cb2245bf02/lanzmann.jpeg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Claude Lanzmann","caption":"Claude Lanzmann","creditText":"Jean-Regis Roustan—Roger Viollet/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/movies/","name":"movies"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4213811/editing-shoah-exclusive-clip/","name":"Watch: Inside the Making of Shoah"}}]}] ```